Leaving kids in vehicles could soon be a crime in Michigan

|
8/23/2005

Truckers and other drivers have seen it before. They pull into a store
parking lot and while walking to the door they notice a youngster, all alone,
sitting helplessly inside a closed vehicle with the driver nowhere to be seen.

A state lawmaker in
Michigan
would like to bring charges against people who leave children in vehicles.

Rep. Bill Van Regenmorter,
R-GeorgetownTownship
, has introduced
a bill that would change the definition of third and fourth degree child abuse
to include any act likely to cause harm to a child.

Existing
Michigan
law requires that a
person must intend to injure a child to face charges, WOOD-TV in
Grand Rapids
reported.

The proposed definition change would include leaving a child alone in a
hot vehicle, even if the child doesn’t get hurt.

The maximum sentence would be imprisonment for one year, the Detroit Free Press reported. If a child
were injured, the penalty would shoot up to 15 years in prison.

The effort to toughen
Michigan
’s
rules follows the deaths of several children in vehicles, including one near
Van Regenmorter’s home district.